Patricia Clarkson facts for kids
Quick facts for kids
Patricia Clarkson
|
|
|---|---|
.jpg)
Clarkson in 2017
|
|
| Born |
Patricia Davies Clarkson
December 29, 1959 New Orleans, Louisiana, U.S.
|
| Education | Louisiana State University Fordham University (BA) Yale University (MFA) |
| Occupation | Actress |
| Years active | 1985–present |
|
Works
|
Full list |
| Parent(s) |
|
| Awards | Full list |
Patricia Davies Clarkson (born December 29, 1959) is a talented American actress. She has played many different roles in movies, from independent films to big studio productions. She has won several important awards, including a Golden Globe Award and three Primetime Emmy Awards. She was also nominated for an Academy Award and a Tony Award.
Clarkson studied acting at the Yale School of Drama. She made her first movie appearance in Brian De Palma's film The Untouchables (1987). She then acted in many other films like The Dead Pool (1988), High Art (1998), The Green Mile (1999), The Pledge (2001), Far from Heaven (2002), and Dogville (2003).
In 2003, she received great praise for her roles. She played a mother dealing with illness who reunites with her daughter in Pieces of April (2003). For this role, she was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress. She also played an artist coping with the loss of her son in The Station Agent (2003). This role earned her a nomination for a Screen Actors Guild Award.
She continued her career with roles in dramas such as Good Night, and Good Luck (2005), All the King's Men (2006), Elegy (2008), Shutter Island (2010), The Party (2017), Monica (2022), and She Said (2022). She also appeared in comedies like Lars and the Real Girl (2007), Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008), Whatever Works (2009), Easy A (2010), Friends with Benefits (2011), and Learning to Drive (2014). From 2014 to 2018, she played the character Ava Paige in the dystopian science-fiction Maze Runner movie series.
On television, she had a recurring role on the HBO series Six Feet Under (2002–2005). For this, she won two Primetime Emmy Awards. She also had recurring roles in the NBC sitcoms Frasier and Parks and Recreation, and the Netflix political drama House of Cards. In the HBO limited series Sharp Objects (2018), she won a Golden Globe Award. She also received nominations for a Primetime Emmy Award and a Screen Actors Guild Award for this role. In 2022, she played a strong-willed wife in the BBC series State of the Union, earning another Primetime Emmy Award.
On stage, Clarkson first appeared on Broadway in the play The House of Blue Leaves (1986). She returned to Broadway in Eastern Standard (1989) and later in The Elephant Man (2014). For The Elephant Man, she was nominated for a Tony Award for Best Featured Actress in a Play. She also made her West End debut in London in the play Long Day's Journey into Night (2024).
Contents
Patricia Clarkson's Early Life
Patricia Clarkson was born on December 29, 1959, in New Orleans, Louisiana. Her mother, Jackie Clarkson, was a politician and councilwoman in New Orleans. Her father, Arthur "Buzz" Clarkson, was a school administrator. Patricia is one of five sisters. All of them went to O. Perry Walker High School, where Patricia graduated in 1977. She grew up in Algiers, a part of New Orleans located on the West Bank of the Mississippi River.
From 1977 to 1979, Clarkson studied speech pathology at Louisiana State University. However, she soon decided she wanted to study drama instead. In 1980, she moved to New York City and transferred to Fordham University. She joined their acting program and graduated with high honors in 1982. After that, she earned her Master of Fine Arts degree from the Yale School of Drama in 1985.
Patricia Clarkson's Acting Career
Starting Her Acting Journey
After finishing her studies at the Yale School of Drama, Patricia Clarkson was cast in a Broadway play called The House of Blue Leaves in 1986. The next year, she made her first movie appearance in Brian De Palma's The Untouchables (1987). She played Catherine Ness, the wife of a US Treasury agent named Eliot Ness (played by Kevin Costner). Clarkson mentioned that she was having financial difficulties at the time, paying off student loans. The director, Brian De Palma, actually made her role in the film bigger than it was originally planned. The following year, she acted alongside Clint Eastwood in The Dead Pool (1988). This was the fifth movie in the Dirty Harry film series.
Clarkson returned to Broadway in 1989 for the play Eastern Standard. In this play, she portrayed a Wall Street investment counselor whose brother was dealing with a serious illness. The play ran from January to March of that year.
Clarkson has shared that in the early 1990s, she found it hard to find significant acting jobs. She had a small role in Jumanji (1995) before being cast in the independent drama High Art (1998). In this film, she played a German actress living in New York City. Her performance earned her a nomination for an Independent Spirit Award for Best Supporting Actress.
In 1998, Clarkson had a small part in the romantic comedy Playing by Heart. She played a woman at a bar listening to a made-up story. In 1999, Clarkson appeared in The Green Mile as the ill wife of a prison warden. This movie was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award for Best Ensemble Cast. That same year, she had a supporting role in the romantic comedy Simply Irresistible. She also appeared in Stanley Tucci's film Joe Gould's Secret (2000).
Next, she played a single mother in the drama The Safety of Objects (2001). She also had a supporting role with Jack Nicholson in the thriller The Pledge (2001), playing the mother of a murder victim. She also took on a main role in the independent horror film Wendigo (2001) and the comedy Welcome to Collinwood (2002). Film critic Roger Ebert praised the acting in Wendigo, saying the actors had a very natural quality. In 2001, she had a recurring role on the TV show Frasier as Claire French, who dated the main character, Frasier Crane.
Becoming a Critically Acclaimed Actress
In 2002, Clarkson was cast in a supporting role in Todd Haynes's drama Far from Heaven. She played the neighbor of a housewife in the 1950s. The same year, she starred as Margaret White in the TV movie Carrie, based on Stephen King's story. Between 2002 and 2005, Clarkson had a guest role on the HBO drama series Six Feet Under. She played Sarah O'Connor, an artist. For this role, she won two Primetime Emmy Awards for Outstanding Guest Actress in a Drama Series in 2002 and 2005.
Clarkson appeared in several independent films in 2003. These included The Baroness and the Pig; Lars von Trier's drama Dogville; and the acclaimed film The Station Agent. In The Station Agent, she played an artist who becomes friends with a man who moves to her town. She also starred in Pieces of April, where she played a mother with a serious illness who travels to see her daughter for Thanksgiving. Another film was the drama All the Real Girls, where she played the mother of a young man in a small southern town. Four of these films, The Baroness and the Pig, Pieces of April, The Station Agent, and All the Real Girls, were shown at the 2003 Sundance Film Festival. Clarkson received many awards for her performances. For The Station Agent, she won a Special Jury Prize at Sundance and was nominated for a Screen Actors Guild Award. Her role in Pieces of April also earned her a Sundance Special Jury Prize, along with nominations for a Screen Actors Guild Award, a Golden Globe Award, and an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actress.
After these successful roles, Clarkson played a lead role with Kurt Russell in the sports drama Miracle (2004). This movie was about the U.S. hockey team's victory in the 1980 Olympics. She also played the wife of a news reporter in George Clooney's historical drama Good Night, and Good Luck (2005). She then starred as the wife of a Hollywood executive in the independent drama The Dying Gaul (2005). In 2006, The Woods, a supernatural horror film she shot in 2003, was released. In it, she played the headmistress of a girls' boarding school. The same year, she played Sadie Burke in All the King's Men, which was set in her hometown of New Orleans.
In 2007, she had a supporting role in the romantic comedy No Reservations. She also appeared in the comedy-drama Lars and the Real Girl, playing a psychiatrist. Later, she co-starred with Ben Kingsley in the drama Elegy (2008). She also had supporting roles in two Woody Allen films: Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) and Whatever Works (2009). In 2008, producer Gerald Peary asked Clarkson to do the voice-over for the documentary film For the Love of Movies: The Story of American Film Criticism. Peary said she was very kind and prepared. One reason she wanted to do the movie was her respect for film criticism. Clarkson returned to New Orleans on January 17, 2009, for the reopening of the Mahalia Jackson Theatre. She hosted a special event featuring Plácido Domingo. She also made a brief appearance in the Saturday Night Live Digital Short "Motherlover" on May 9, 2009. She appeared in a similar short, "3-Way (The Golden Rule)", on May 21, 2011.
Continued Success in Film and TV
In 2010, Clarkson appeared with Leonardo DiCaprio in the Martin Scorsese-directed thriller Shutter Island. She played a woman who escaped from a psychiatric institution. Clarkson said getting the call for this role was very exciting. The film was a big success at the box office.
Clarkson then had roles in two independent films: Legendary and Main Street (both 2010). She also appeared in two comedies directed by Will Gluck: Easy A (2010), where she played the mother of a high school student, and Friends with Benefits (2011), as the mother of an executive. She also appeared in the romantic drama One Day (2011) and guest-starred on two episodes of the comedy series Parks and Recreation. In 2013, she had a supporting role in the thriller The East (2013).
In 2014, Clarkson returned to Broadway in The Elephant Man with Bradley Cooper. This role earned her a Tony Award nomination. The same year, she starred with Ben Kingsley in the comedy-drama film Learning to Drive. She played Wendy, a middle-aged New York book critic learning to drive. John Patterson of The Guardian praised her performance, saying she was a "miraculous performer." That same year, she played the villain Ava Paige in the hit movie The Maze Runner. This was a dystopian film based on a young adult novel. She played the role again in the sequels: Maze Runner: The Scorch Trials (2015) and Maze Runner: The Death Cure (2018).
Clarkson starred in the drama The Party in 2017, directed by Sally Potter. For this film, she won a British Independent Film Award for Best Supporting Actress. The same year, she co-starred with Emily Mortimer and Bill Nighy in The Bookshop. This drama was set in 1959 and involved two women trying to get a building for their businesses. She also guest-starred on the fifth and sixth seasons (2017–2018) of the Netflix political drama series House of Cards. She played Jane Davis, a government official.
She later starred in the science fiction film Jonathan and the psychological horror film Delirium. Clarkson also starred with Amy Adams in the psychological drama miniseries Sharp Objects (2018). She played the wealthy mother of a reporter investigating a murder. For her performance, Clarkson won a Golden Globe Award.
In 2023, Clarkson took on the lead role in the spy thriller series Gray. She played CIA agent Cornelia Gray, who returns to her old life after twenty years in hiding. The series explores a mole within the spy network she once belonged to.
Patricia Clarkson's Personal Life
After the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, Clarkson wrote a post for the Natural Resources Defense Council's magazine OnEarth. She also released a public service announcement talking about growing up in New Orleans. Both were released on July 26, 2010.
Clarkson lives in New York City. She has never married and does not have children. She stated in a 2013 interview that she was "born without that gene" for wanting to marry or have children. Three of her four sisters have children, and she is very close to her nieces and nephews. One of her nephews, Mac Alsfeld, is an actor, writer, and director.
Acting Credits
Patricia Clarkson made her film debut in The Untouchables (1987). She then had a supporting role in The Dead Pool (1988). She appeared in many supporting roles in films like The Green Mile (1999), The Pledge (2001), Far from Heaven (2002), Dogville (2003), The Station Agent (2003), and Pieces of April (2003). Other notable films include Good Night, and Good Luck (2005), Lars and the Real Girl (2007), and Elegy (2008). She also appeared in Woody Allen films Vicky Cristina Barcelona (2008) and Whatever Works (2009). In 2010, Clarkson had a supporting role in the thriller Shutter Island. This was followed by roles in the comedies Easy A and Friends with Benefits. She played Ava Paige in The Maze Runner (2014) and its two sequels. In 2017, she co-starred in Sally Potter's drama The Party and guest-starred on the Netflix series House of Cards. She co-starred with Amy Adams on the HBO miniseries Sharp Objects in 2018.
Awards and Nominations
Clarkson was honored by the Jameson Dublin International Film Festival. She received one of the 2010 Volta awards for her achievements in her career.
See also
In Spanish: Patricia Clarkson para niños
